Obama perfectly explains the point of the phrase 'black lives matter'

US President Barack Obama has a message for critics of the
"Black Lives Matter" movement: You're missing the point.

Toward the end of a public White House discussion about
criminal-justice reform, Obama took a moment to push back
against detractors who claim that the phrase "Black Lives
Matter" — originally coined in reaction to police violence
against unarmed African-Americans — discounts the lives of white
police officers.

"I think the reason that the organizers use the phrase 'black
lives matter' was not because they were suggesting that no one
else's lives matter," Obama said. "Rather, what they were
suggesting was there is a specific problem that is happening in
the African-American community that isn't happening in other
communities. And that is a legitimate issue that we have to
address. The African-American community is not just
making this up. It's not just something being politicized.
This is real."

The Black Lives Matter movement, which gained steam
following the killing of an unarmed 17-year-old black teenager in
Ferguson, Missouri, last year, has sought to bring attention to
racial bias in the criminal-justice system and the
disproportionate number of black individuals killed by
police.

Critics claim that Black Lives Matter protesters
unfairly target the police and omit discussions about the values
of other lives.

But Thursday, Obama called that argument "an old trap."

Black Lives Matter protesters "started being lifted up as, 'These
folks are opposed to the police, they are opposed to cops, all
lives matter,'" Obama said.

"So the notion was that somehow saying 'black lives
matter' was reverse racism or something. And whenever
we get bogged down in that kind of discussion, we know where that
goes. That's just down the old trap," he added. "Everyone understands that all lives matter.
Everybody wants strong, effective law enforcement. Everybody
wants their kids to be safe when they're walking to
school."

Former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush and retired neurosurgeon Ben Carson
have dismissed the phrase, while former
Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee — all Republicans — said that
civil-rights leader Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. would have been
appalled by the phrase.

"When I hear people scream, 'black lives matter,' I think, of
course they do. But all lives matter. It's not that any life
matters more than another," Huckabee
said. "That's the whole message that Dr. King tried to
present, and I think he'd be appalled by the notion that we're
elevating some lives above others."

Democrats, after getting off to a somewhat rocky start with
protesters who interrupted several 2016 campaign events, have
attempted to mend fences with the movement.

Notable members of the Black Lives Matter movement, which
remains officially leaderless, have met with several presidential
candidates, including former US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton
and US Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vermont), who have embraced the
phrase and called for criminal-justice reform efforts.